1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to telecommunications systems, and amongst other things to a method of dynamically scheduling multiple events in a telecommunications system with asymmetric demand. The invention is yet further related to the scheduling and completion of appointments.
2. Discussion of Background
There are approximately 650,000 physicians in the United States spending an average of one hour per day on the phone with patients. This time is typically unscheduled, disruptive to other work, and almost always uncompensated. Neither physician nor patient is satisfied for numerous reasons, all resolved by the invention. The invention facilitates and documents scheduled medical telephone appointments and collects payment for the physician, enabling physicians to efficiently serve patients telephonically, when medically appropriate, thereby enhancing physician revenue and patient satisfaction.
Medical telephone services are fragmented and in disarray. Telephone medicine has become a major way that physicians provide care, but it remains informal, unstructured, and uncompensated. In its current form, telephone medicine substantially adds to the stress and dissatisfaction of physicians and patients, alike. Physicians are unhappy because it provides no revenue, has grown to a significant percentage of the work they do, and is disruptive. Patients, while they like the convenience of being able to talk to their doctor by phone, are unhappy with telephone medicine as currently practiced because it is unscheduled, and they generally spend a lot of time either playing phone tag with their physician, or waiting by the phone for a call back. The current arrangement results in delayed care, mutual frustration, and considerable administrative costs associated with managing the multiple missed calls.
Some patients have grown accustomed to accessing their physician by telephone, regardless of time of day or urgency of need, and without additional cost. In an effort to reduce the stress generated by these existing disruptive calls and driven by the desire to be compensated for the time spent consulting patients, some physicians are employing a policy of not seeing patients—either in the office or on the phone—without a scheduled appointment.
A physician must treat all patient calls as necessary, yet the necessity is often determined by the patient with no financial obligation for the physicians' telephone time. As a result, unwarranted calls are made, and expected to be either accepted or returned within a reasonable time. The lost revenue and disruption to the physicians practice create an atmosphere of being rushed and a feeling of resentment.
When patients have their very first office visit with a physician, they feel the entitlement of access to that physician, as if the $65 office visit was the price of a retainer. The process of changing the behavior of patients, especially those that abuse the willingness of a physician to return calls, has met with resistance from patients and office staff alike.